This year’s civil-rights
holiday also marks overthrow

Pioneering civil-rights work by Martin Luther King Jr. and the overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom will be remembered in a joint commemoration starting today.

HOLIDAY TO HONOR BOTH KING, QUEEN The public is invited to attend the following activities commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the overthrow of Queen Liliuokalani free of charge: » Today, noon -- Royal Hawaiian Band concert at Iolani Palace honoring Queen Liliuokalani and Martin Luther King Jr. » Tomorrow, 6 p.m. -- "Lift Every Voice and Sing," music from different ethnic groups, at the Mission Memorial Auditorium on the Honolulu Hale Civic Center grounds. Jan Shima, who was nominated for a Hoku award for contemporary gospel, will perform along with the Immanuel Missionary Baptist Church Quartet and Choir, Jerry B. Wilson and the Ministry of Fire, Kahana O Ke Akua Church, and the New Hope Chapel. All donations to the free events will be given to the American Red Cross for tsunami relief. » Sunday, 6:30 p.m. -- Nagasaki Peace Bell Ringing Ceremony, beginning with the Royal Hawaiian Band playing the Queen's music, Honolulu Hale Civic Center grounds. » Monday, 9 a.m. -- Holiday parade featuring 80 units of bands, beauty queens, community and political organizations, and unions, starting at Magic Island, through Waikiki to Kapiolani Park. Unity rally to follow at the park from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with food, entertainment, crafts and games for kids. » Monday, 7 p.m. -- Church of the Crossroads service to honor Peacemaker Award winner Charles Pe'ape'a Makawalu Kekuewa Burrows, for the preservation of the lands of indigenous people; and Hawaii Lifetime Peacemaker Award winner Glenn Paige, University of Hawaii professor emeritus, who wrote "Nonkilling Global Political Science." For more information, visit www.mlk-hawaii.org.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day falls on Jan. 17 this year, officially observed on the third Monday in January. Because Jan. 17 was the same day U.S. troops overthrew the Hawaiian kingdom in 1893, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Coalition President Patricia Anthony said her group thought it would be "a wonderful thing" to work with Hawaiian groups to celebrate the holiday together.

"Both Queen Liliuokalani and Dr. King, though they lived in different times and were two different people, believed in peace. They would not shed one drop of their people's blood.

"Martin Luther King wouldn't shed his people's blood even though we were just being massacred" during civil-rights demonstrations, said Anthony, whose father is African American/American Indian and mother is Hawaiian/Chinese/ Portuguese.

King, whose birthday is Jan. 15, 1929, was assassinated in 1968. The pastor of a Baptist church in Montgomery, Ala., he won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize.

Anthony said King worked for equal rights for working-class people, not just for African Americans. He was shot in Memphis, Tenn., by James Earl Ray while campaigning on behalf of striking garbage workers.

"That's why every year you'll see in the parade a garbage truck in there somewhere. He stood for all ethnic groups," she added.

Anthony said the United States should have taken up peaceful, nonviolent protest against terrorism.

"America jumped a little too fast into war (with Iraq). ... They found no weapons of mass destruction. We should have taken our time and waited" and looked for a peaceful means to fight terrorism, she said.

"When you look at the civil-rights movement films" shown on the 'Olelo channel through Monday, "even though we were just about beat half to death, with dogs turned on us ... people kicking us and beating us to the ground, protesters never raised their hands to defend themselves," Anthony said.